Monster Hurricane Dennis heads for US Gulf Coast

By Frances Kerry

MIAMI (Reuters) – Deadly Hurricane Dennis strengthened into
a monster storm capable of causing serious damage as it
thundered toward the U.S. Gulf Coast, forecast to hit land
later on Sunday somewhere near the Alabama-Florida border.

Dennis, which killed 32 people in a rampage past Haiti and
over Cuba before heading into the Gulf of Mexico early on
Saturday, was carrying winds of 135 mph (217 kph) by early on
Sunday morning and forecasters said it could strengthen further
before slamming ashore.

The hurricane was on a track to hit land in an area still
recovering from a punishing hit last September by Hurricane
Ivan.

Forecasters at the U.S. National Hurricane Center said
early on Sunday that Dennis, which intensified as it rolled
north over the warm waters of the Gulf of Mexico during
Saturday, had strengthened into a category 4 hurricane on the
five-step Saffir-Simpson scale.

Such storms carry winds of more than 130 mph (208 kph) and
a threat of flooding up to six miles inland from low-lying
coastal areas. They are capable of causing major damage –
shredding mobile homes, ripping roofs off some buildings,
seriously damaging doors and windows and felling big trees.

“This is going to do a lot of damage before it’s all over,”
Max Mayfield, director of the hurricane center, told CNN late
on Saturday.

Authorities in Florida, Alabama and Mississippi urged more
than 1.2 million people in vulnerable low-lying areas to leave
their homes and many heeded the warning, streaming away in long
lines of cars all day Saturday and draining gas stations dry.

Forecasters warned Dennis could bring a storm surge of up
to 17 feet above normal tide levels, and rainfall of as much as
12 inches (31 cm) in the area where it makes landfall.

‘ADDITIONAL STRENGTHENING’

At 1 a.m. EDT (0500 GMT) on Sunday, the center of Dennis
was about 235 miles south of Panama City, the hurricane center
said. It was heading northwest at about 14 mph (22 kph) on a
track that would bring its eye over land sometime on Sunday
afternoon.

“Some additional strengthening is possible before
landfall,” the center said.

Dennis threatened key oil and natural gas fields in the
Gulf of Mexico, where a quarter of U.S. production comes from.
Energy companies pulled hundreds of workers off oil rigs and
shut down some crude and natural gas production.

Pensacola, a city where blue tarps still cover some houses
whose roofs were damaged by Ivan, became a ghost town as
residents fled the approaching storm.

Some people who decided to stay as Dennis approached
shuttered their houses with recycled boards bearing the words
“Go Away Ivan.”

Ivan was one of an unprecedented four hurricanes to hit
Florida in the same storm season. Florida officials said some
40,000 homes statewide had not been fixed yet.

“We’re scared,” said Lee Schoen, 48, a youth services
worker who said she was boarding up her waterfront home on
Mobile Bay in Alabama and getting out. “We’re moving our
valuables and things you can’t replace and going to my
mother-in-law’s.”

Before heading north through the Gulf, Dennis grazed
southern Florida, brushing past the popular tourist island of
Key West on the state’s southern tip. State officials said
163,000 homes and businesses were without power by Saturday
evening.

The hurricane hit Cuba on Friday with 150 mph (240 kph)
winds and crumpled homes, uprooted trees and downed power
lines. But its winds weakened to 90 mph (145 kph) as it crossed
the island before roaring away from the island of 11 million
people late on Friday night

Ten people were killed in Cuba and 22 in Haiti, where the
storm caused flooding as it brushed past earlier in the week.

(Additional reporting by Cathy Donelson in Mobile, Jennifer
Portman in Tallahassee and Jim Loney in Miami)